EF Vespers Help
  • avscvltaavscvlta
    Posts: 80
    For the past couple of years I've been doing sung OF Vespers using the Mundelein Psalter and Lumen Christi Hymnal. A few of us meet at the church every Sunday night.

    If I want to switch to OF Sunday Vespers every week, what books would I need? (I prefer books to booklets.) I want to do it correctly to be liturgical.

    I've heard there's a solemn form if Sunday Vespers, and I don't think we would do that. It is just a small group of lay singers of low skill level, who want to sing Vespers.
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 1,951
    Did you mean EF as in the title? (You then put "OF" in the second paragraph.) In that case, the texts for Sunday Vespers are all contained in the Liber Usualis, available used and new (for different editions and in varying condition for the former). There are some rubrical oddities that arise which singers need to know about if one uses the Liber and isn't familiar with it and with the 1962 office, but nothing changes for the singers regardless of whether the ceremonies are celebrated fully or whether Vespers is simply sung.

    Now, other feasts can usually be found in the Liber, including all feasts that could possibly replace Sunday, but you might need the Antiphonale Romanum (available as a PDF…) or a copy of the Breviarium Romanum to supplement it, e.g. if you ever sang Vespers in order to pray the O antiphons on a weekday, you'd need the breviary for the chapter and the ferial preces. There wouldn't be any other books needed unless you had proper offices, like of the patron saint of the parish, that replaced a Sunday and aren't in the Liber, but that's a fairly rare case.
    Thanked by 1avscvlta
  • avscvltaavscvlta
    Posts: 80
    Thank you! Yes I meant EF Vespers. Sorry for the confusion...

    Wow so it's that easy to get all the chants for Sunday! Just order a set of these, sounds like, and we should be good to go.
    Liber
  • avscvltaavscvlta
    Posts: 80
    Where can I get the ordo for EF 2021, so I can create the leaflets and make a list of all the antiphons I need to learn for the year?
  • Chris Garton-Zavesky
    Posts: 6,902
    AVSCVLTA,

    The simplest way to make this happen ( I think) is to visit either divinumofficium.org (where all the texts exist, and an ordo is an option at the top of the page), or Albert Bloomfield's site where Vespers booklets are readily available.

    Solemn Vespers has slightly more elaborate chants in a few places. (Deus in adjutorium...., the tones for the Magnificat)
    Thanked by 2avscvlta Chrism
  • tomjaw
    Posts: 2,704
    To make an Ordo, you will also need to know all the local feasts (National, Diocese, local patrons and the dedication / Patron of the Parish).
    Thanked by 1avscvlta
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 1,951
    The easiest way to get an ordo is to buy an ordo from the FSSP, St John Cantius, etc. The first one is particularly helpful in America (I've seen it), and that will get you a lot further, e.g. quite a few people forget about Our Lady of Guadalupe as a feast day in the US (I or II class, depending on your diocese) or the North American Martyrs.

    You can get the diocesan information from your parish's ordo, because it tells you the names of the patron or patrons and when the cathedral dedication is celebration — that's a feast of the highest rank in the traditional form — even if the date of a feast was changed in 1969… If you really want to do it right, check the decrees of consecration and that of the erection of the parish for information about the patronage and consecration as would have been done back in the day. I know a St Paul's parish where the patronal feast is celebrated on the feast of the Conversion of St Paul, not on June 29 (Ss Peter and Paul) nor June 30 (the Commemoration of St Paul, a double major on the pre-1962 calendar). Or take Indianapolis, for example, the bishop of which consecrated its cathedral on December 21, meaning that St Thomas gets bumped quite a long ways away.

    The Magnificat tones depend more on the rank of the feast (usually the highest two ranks, as well as the days on which the O antiphons are sung) than whether there are ceremonies at the office.
    Thanked by 2CHGiffen avscvlta
  • avscvltaavscvlta
    Posts: 80
    Thanks for the help! I'll take a look at the Liber Usualis and the FSSP ordo, and we'll see if this is something my group will want to move to in the future.
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